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Ready for the next round

Tim Reynolds and Brian Mahoney
9:21 p.m. PDT May 4, 2014

Portland Trail Blazers’ Damian Lillard, center, celebrates with teammates after making the winning shot against the Rockets, ending Houston’s run in the playoffs, on Friday. The Blazers take on the San Antonio Spurs on Tuesday.
(Photo:
AP
)

It’s official: The Trail Blazers will play the San Antonio Spurs in Round 2 of the Western Conference playoffs on Tuesday night.

Season series: Tied, 2-2. Both teams won once on the other’s home floor. The Trail Blazers won the first two matchups of the season, and one of the Spurs’ wins came with Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Kawhi Leonard all sitting out a game at Portland.

Story line: It’s the veterans against the up-and-comers. San Antonio held things together perfectly after losing in last season’s NBA Finals, finishing this season with the league’s best record. The Spurs got taken to the limit by Dallas in the first round, while Portland got a buzzer-beater from Damian Lillard to oust Houston in six games — and the Blazers surely won’t be feeling any pressure now.

Key matchup I: Tony Parker vs. Lillard. The guard play in this series could be phenomenal, and it starts with these two. Game 1 of this series will be Parker’s 180th postseason game. Lillard hasn’t appeared in that many games — regular-season and postseason combined — in his career.

Key matchup II: Tim Duncan vs. LaMarcus Aldridge. There might have been no better player in the first round of the postseason than Aldridge, who averaged 29.8 points and 11.2 rebounds in the six games against Houston. Duncan, though, is still widely considered the gold standard when it comes to post play, especially in the playoffs.

X-factor: Danny Green. The San Antonio sharpshooter was enormous for the Spurs in last season’s NBA Finals, his 3-point barrages giving Miami fits. If he gets remotely close to that hot again, Portland will have to take attention away from Duncan, Parker and Manu Ginobili — which plays right into San Antonio’s hands.

Prediction: Spurs in 6.

More inside

Read about the rest of the playoff matchups and other NBA news on Page 2C.

On TV

The No. 1 San Antonio Spurs (62-20, 4-3) will face off with the No. 5 Portland Trail Blazers (54-28, 4-2) at 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday at AT&T Center in San Antonio. The game will air on TNT.